The present invention relates to the shoulder rest for violins, violas or the like instruments. Shoulder rests for violins and the like instruments are used to provide comfortability and stability while a player holds and plays the instrument. While many shoulder rests are on the market, the types that allow the shoulder rest to be folded or collapsible while retaining adjustability and firmness are most popular because of the ability of these types of shoulder rests to conserve storage space in an instrument case.
However, many adjustable and collapsible shoulder rests involve numerous moving parts including a variety of pins, bolts, screws, and other moving parts that increase the chance of malfunction and breakage. Additionally, many current adjustable and collapsible shoulder rests leave the pivot or collapsible area open and unprotected, which results in potential injury to the fingers of the user. Prior patents showing such rests include: U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,731,531; 5,419,226; 5,270,474; 5,567,893; 6,031,163; and 6,291,750.
Further, many prior art have proposed clamp ends or gripping ends in the form of a “U-Shaped” configuration, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,419,226 above. However, the U-Shaped clamping ends have smaller contact surface to the instrument body edge, thus creating less friction force to clamp securely to the shoulder rest without slipping.
While these devices may be suitable for the particular purpose to which they address, they are not suitable for incorporating the advantages of a fully adjustable and collapsible shoulder rest that has fewer moving parts to reduce malfunction and breakage and vertical guards that protect and prevent the user's fingers from being pinched or caught within the pivot or collapsible areas of the shoulder rest.
In these respects, the shoulder rest according to the present invention substantially departs from the conventional concepts and designs of the prior art, and in so doing provides an adjustable and collapsible shoulder rest that is not anticipated, rendered obvious, suggested, or even implied by any of the prior art shoulder rests, either alone or in combination thereof